The Encyclopedia of Amazons: Women Warriors From Antiquity to the Modern Era by Jessica Amanda Salmonson

This book was published in 1991 and includes entries for Anne Bonney and Mary Read, citing as references Mistress of the Seas, Women Remembered, Histoire de la piraterie, and Women of the Sea. Salmonson claims that Anne was a lesbian, which is “the one thing reporters are loathe to tell about” her. She says Anne and Mary were lovers, while Jack Rackam was in a couple with Carlova’s Pierre, who was responsible for “Anne’s black velvet pants and Jack’s famous calico coat.” Salmonson also insists that Jack did not introduce Anne to piracy, but instead that he had never committed a piracy before meeting her, and that she used him as a sockpuppet. Salmonson says that at some point the two couples attempted to settle down together, but their crimes were too infamous. She writes that Mary fought a duel to save an “‘actor’ cum navigator”, being careful to omit any hint that this was her boyfriend. (This is presumably based off of de la Croix, who originally described Mr Read as an artiste–in the English version this was translated as actor.) Salmonson says that Anne and Mary were not pregnant at their trial (it being a “peculiar coincidence” that they were both pregnant when it was convenient), but that “A wiser investigator” (than those who “failed to see through” the lie) found out that they were chummy with the doctor. (This wiser investigator being Susan Baker.) Salmonson says the cause of Mary’s death is “believed” to be pneumonia and then bizarrely suggests that Anne either “escaped and lived quietly” or was eventually executed “with a group of fanatical nuns over whom she held sway.”